The Blue Falcon Page 14

  Conan yielded with much more grace to Thurwell’s re­mark, for he knew these two men well. They knew the ways of the forest better than he. Though they had never confided the details of their earlier days, Conan thought it likely that before they earned the right to wield swords in defense of the king, they spent long periods of time in royal forests dodging the king’s henchmen for crimes of poaching. The penalty for shooting a deer in such a wood was more often than not death by hanging. Nobles were allowed to hunt, specifically hunts­men commissioned to hunt for the lord to provide for his table. Commoners were not. Neither of these two were born to noble families, but had fought long and hard to achieve their positions. He already knew that they made their way to honorable knighthood as mercenaries, a profession not looked upon with much adoration.

  “We’ll find nothing on this heavily traveled path,” Mallory grumbled, cutting from the worn trail and using his sword to clear away the brush as he went. The others followed. They encountered no clearings or animals but for an occasional rabbit or fox darting past them into the deep brush.

  They came across a shallow stream and for a time followed that for convenience. They walked silently on until the sun was high in the sky.

  “How sits this wood with you, Conan?” Mallory asked.

  “‘Tis a thick wood, but I see no reason an army could not enter and make a camp. And I wonder how the huntsmen furnish food for the hall. Do they dine only on chicken and pork?”

  “This is not a primitive wood,” Thurwell said confidently. “It is inhabited, Conan, but I say with beasts of a two-legged type.”

  “Men? But there has been no sign,” Conan argued. “No camp, no broken fires, no sound.”

  “Game would drink at the stream and we would have encountered a group of deer by now, but that smell of man lingers all about us. I’ve seen a fork in the path more than twice, but covered with brush.” Mallory walked nearer Conan and dropped an arm about his shoulders. “Had you not wondered at the many small children in the village when there seems to be a certain lack of men?” He let go with a loud riotous laugh that echoed through the trees, and Thurwell joined in. “Aye, Lady Chandra needs no wall to keep her safe.”

  Conan looked in confusion to his amused friends. “They are a crafty lot, are they not?” Mallory nodded in agreement while Conan stood perplexed. Finally Thurwell attempted to explain his hunch. “Sir Conan, you command a sturdy troop of men, none of them overly ugly and all paid generously for their services. But the womenfolk did not greet your men-at-arms with great eagerness.”

  “And they would have been soundly beaten had they dared,” came a voice from behind.

  They turned as one to view a man coming through the trees. Conan’s hand went directly to the hilt of his sword, ready to fight, but the man smiled and held up his hands as if to ward off this aggressor.

  “Nay, Sir Conan,” the man said good-naturedly. “I am bidden by my lady Chandra to guide you should you become lost.”

  “And who are you?” Conan questioned, looking the man over. He wore naught but a leather tunic, with only a hunting knife at his waist. A rude bow rode his shoulder and a bundle of arrows was handy at his back.

  “I am called Sir William,” the man said, bowing.

  “Sir William?” Conan echoed.

  Mallory stepped near to Conan and said softly in his ear, “The master of the lady’s guard, is my guess.”

  “Master of the guard,” he mimicked. The man certainly did not have the look of a knight, and there seemed to be no order of men. But just as he was about to voice his confusion, the trees bled men. An army donned in simple clothes, bearing no more than the hunting knife and bow, surrounded them on all sides. Conan spun about in wonder, surveying the massive number of ready warriors. And then Chandra’s words rang through his mind: I would keep my wood, my moat and wall, from the knowledge of great armies of men. Suddenly aware, Conan threw back his head and laughed loudly.

  In the following days, Conan learned of the dynamic and subtle protection of Cordell. The men were certainly not noble lords or knights, but men of the town who had been raised partially in the wood. While many were always about the forest, many lived with their families in the village unless called. When a large party of knights or other travelers ventured down the road toward Cordell, they were seen by those who kept a constant vigil near the only reasonable entrance. At the first call, others came from the village and watched the town from the forest. They were an unknown force. And Conan learned that the fishermen watched the coast as carefully as the huntsmen watched the land side of the manor.

  It was a system long in practice that worked ideally for this small burgh. Visitors who queried those in the town about their lack of guard went away unsatisfied, for it was a ploy that worked only as long as no outsiders knew their methods.

  Conan learned, in the course of seven days, the ways of the forest that surrounded the keep, and the village and shore. There were caves along the rocks that were known only by the fishermen, entrances to the forest, out of sight of the keep or the road, known only to those who guarded the wood. And all this was shown to him by order of the lady of the manor.

  When Chandra’s duties at Cordell were done, she did not dally. Preparations for her return to Phalen were made at once. The carts stood ready outside the keep and the knights mounted their horses. Sir Conan took Sir William’s hand and grasped it fondly.

  “I give you my word, Sir William, that your secret is safe with me. If ever you have need of my troop, you have but to send word to me.”

  “And in like, my lord,” William answered with heartfelt fondness. “If you have need of my aid, you have but to ask.”

  When the troop was departing, with Conan and his com­rades again leading the way and Chandra and her women again at the rear, one of the lesser men-at-arms rode to the front to speak to his lord.

  “Sir Conan,” he ventured carefully. “You’ve left no men behind, and there was no talk of sending men-at-arms to Cordell. I thought it was your plan to leave it better protected than you found it.”

  “And so I have,” he said, a smile playing about his lips.

  “And how, sir? I see no protection for them.”

  “Nature protects them. The forest and the sea.”

  Chapter 7

  The lady of Anselm ventured as often as her serving women into the village. She frequented many of the shops, though she did not go to make purchases. The weavers, carpenters, bakers and smithy would all come to the hall for her needs, but in the town there might be a peddler or traveling friar. Besides bringing spices and unusual fabrics, something apart from the linen and wool that made up nearly all of every person’s clothing, they would bring news from other towns. The traveling friar was better, for he would bring mainly news and would be found lingering in the village streets to talk to the peasants.

  And of course Udele wanted to visit the lacemaker. The lord was not ignorant of his townspeople, nor was he ignorant of Udele’s visits to the lacemaker’s shop. Alaric, quite simply, thought little of it. The village priest, Father Ambert, a young and determined man, asked Alaric to put a halt to Giselle’s incantations and predictions. Alaric turned to Udele.

  “Do you visit her shop often?” he had asked.

  “As often as any other,” was her reply.

  “Do you think her a dangerous unbeliever?”

  “Dangerous?” she laughed. “As dangerous as a butterfly, my lord. She plays and does no harm. Let her be.”

  “Have you asked her for predictions?” he queried.

  “Aye, a few times,” she said without much concern.

  “And?”

  “Sometimes she is right. Other times--” Udele shrugged, pretending disinterest in the subject. To put an end to Alaric’s questions she told him things that would make it seem that Giselle was often inaccurate. “She told me I would bear you two children. Another time she warned me that Edythe’s birth would be difficult, which it was. But the villeins put m
ore stock in her predictions than I, and if it gives them hope I say she does no harm.”

  “Udele,” he asked seriously, “have you asked her to perform spells for you?”

  She laughed lightly and admitted without much fear that she had asked Giselle to give her potions to make her first child healthy and strong. “I see no harm in that, my lord. I was so lonely that my greatest fear was that my child would die. But,” she went on in her sweet and seductive way, “I was not lonely for very long.”

  It was not difficult for Udele to help Alaric out of his suspicious or angry moods. She knew the way to his heart and was the greatest sorceress in her own right, using her cajoling and alluring nature as her potions.

  But he was lord and the responsibility was his. Though he would have the matter done, he made one further attempt to find fault with the lacemaker.

  “Father Ambert says that you take predictions quite seri­ously, and that you are most often in her shop. Her potions are a sacrilege.”

  “Father Ambert! Are not our confessions private? That good priest is the confessor of many more young maids than farmers, and does he not love his wine and hold a sizable portion of the tithe for his own purse? He is a jealous and selfish man and Giselle is a Jewess. He would burn her for a sorceress, but she abides under your protection. He hates her for that, my lord, not for the games she plays with her sight.”

  The matter as it stood held Alaric silent. He did not meddle with the church. It was a power he never wished to defeat; and the sins of those in service to the faith were not his concern. If it was true that Ambert was seen coursing the streets in the late hours, Alaric did not wish to know. That the priest was handsome and held himself nobly attracted the women and perturbed the men, but not much else was said in criticism. And Alaric would be the last to say any­thing against him.

  The subject was closed in Alaric’s mind, but what he had failed to see was the possibility that it was not toward Giselle that Father Ambert directed his vengeance, but toward Lady Udele herself. It was his spiritual duty to denounce sorcery, and he knew, as did many others, of the mortal spells Lady Udele had cast using information she had forced from Giselle.

  Father Ambert was a young man and the sensual aura his good looks gave him was his curse. He hated Udele for seeing this in him. And he hated her for the fact that he found her tempting, her beauty spellbinding. And the worst of it was that she seemed to know it. She taunted him with his humanness, asking if he wouldn’t like to be more than her confessor. Father Ambert was filled at once with desire and hatred, which he found equally unsettling.

  But just as Father Ambert could not speak to Alaric about his wife, neither could any other. To discredit the faithful and beautiful Udele to the lord took not only courage, but a monstrous lack of good sense. Because Alaric wished them to honor and worship her, all the people of the village, including the priest, made it seem as though they did. In truth, they feared more than admired her.

  As Father Ambert knelt to his prayers this cool September morning, he felt a chill pass through him. His mind went momentarily blank and his eyes opened and shone with a strange light. At that same moment, in the village, Giselle opened her door to the lady of Anselm and bade her enter, the priest went back to his prayers, wondering at the strange sensation. Giselle locked the door to her shop and pulled the curtain over the window. The crystal stone sat majestically on its scarlet cloth.

  “I awoke with a feeling this morn,” Udele said. “I want to know about my son. Where is he now?”

  The battle of whether or not to inform Udele of Conan’s acts or future had already been lost. Now the seer was making what attempts she could to buffer her information, giving enough to satisfy without giving away any real clues as to what was to come. But with this she took increasing care, for Udele was not only shrewd: it was almost as if she had absorbed some of this gift.

  “He is only miles away--on his way to Anselm.”

  “He is! Somehow I knew. I could feel him riding toward me!”

  Giselle thought for a moment and then bravely she blurted out the rest.

  “He is anxious to see his father. He will stay only one night.”

  The priest rose from his prayers, the ill feeling still with him. He covered his head with his hood and went into the village, being drawn toward trouble, though he did not know where he was bound.

  “Conan went to London on behalf of my lord husband and Sir Medwin. Many nobles went. Henry has made an alliance with Philip of France and they talk of Crusade.”

  “They talk,” Giselle said confidently. “Henry will not go on Crusade.”

  “Thank God,” Udele breathed. “Conan must not Crusade. I will not lose him to the infidels!”

  Giselle bit her tongue against what she saw. “Even I do not know what strange alliances will be formed between King Henry and his sons and Philip. A pledge to Crusade today will fall apart tomorrow under the strain of smaller battles.”

  “Where has he been? Has he seen Medwin?”

  “Yea, to deliver the news that his wife is with child.”

  “Of course,” Udele conceded. “And Medwin would be pleased.”

  “As you must be, madam,” Giselle replied, hoping they were finished for today.

  “I expect him to keep her belly full. What else can Edwina do for him but bear his children?” It was not a question but a disdainful statement. She had chosen Edwina because she could hold no strong charm over Conan, yet held her in contempt for the same reason.

  “What of the wench, Chandra?” Udele asked brazenly.

  “Lady Chandra,” Giselle said, straightening. “She serves her father in all things now, for Medwin is growing old and weak. She does more to manage his home and lands than he does.”

  Udele’s mouth twitched in distaste. To learn that Chandra was good and strong did not whet her appetite for the maid. “Well, what does she feel for Conan now? Does she still lust after him?”

  “I cannot tell, madam. I cannot see into her mind, you know that.”

  “Then for Conan--what does he feel for her? You have the shirt I gave you, do you not?”

  Giselle had to break her mood to fetch the clothing. When she was seated again, caressing the shirt, she saw into the mind of Sir Conan. Her eyes stung with tears she would not shed. She felt his struggle as acutely as he felt it. He loved beyond all reason and beyond all good sense. He felt for his wife an indifference that was often turned to scorn for her lack of effort in her wifely obligations. With the scorn came the guilt that tore him end from end. Honoring her as his bride brought him pain and sorrow.

  And for Chandra his passion grew stronger. First it was her beauty and vitality that drew him near loving her, then it blended into a more confused combination of desire, respect, admiration and appreciation of her many admirable qualities. And again the guilt--for his feelings. The earth and stars knew they would find each other. He had been cast by a meddlesome mortal into a mold he could not fit.

  From outside this psychic world Udele prodded Giselle to tell her what she was seeing.

  “This garment has been a long time from the knight’s body, madam. It is weak and my vision is not clear.”

  “I will bring you something new. For now, try harder.”

  Giselle felt the intensity of their struggle during the long stay at Cordell. She felt the pain of their parting when Chandra was delivered home to her father. Conan’s words were so loud she wondered if Udele heard them. “I must hasten to your sister. She will fret the more while I am away.” And Chandra, soft and melodious: “Care for her well, Sir Conan. I love her dearly and want her happiness above my own.” There was a touching of hands, one tortured touch that was too much and too little and left both souls hungering and aching. And he rode away from her.

  “Conan is greatly appreciative of Chandra’s many capabili­ties, but as I can see, his oath is the same: to be a good husband to Edwina.”

  “Aha!” Udele shrieked in delight. “Now you must see the
wisdom in what I have done! It does not matter that he does not love Edwina. This business with Chandra will come to naught. My son’s word is his life.”

  Giselle looked at Udele sharply. “I did not say Lady Chandra was the one for Conan.”

  “No, you did not say, but I am no fool. It was not difficult to reason. But I think,” she said thoughtfully, “it would be best if Medwin saw her wed.”

  Giselle was still in touch with Conan’s feelings, and she could see what would come to pass. Within this dark cloud of unhappiness there was still a glimmer of hope. Sir Conan could not know that hope existed. She struggled for an answer that would dissuade Udele. She struggled for a lie. “Though I cannot see her mind, her beauty is no mystery to me. She will marry soon enough, madam.”

  “Not soon enough to give me peace of mind,” Udele snarled, rising from the table. She dropped some silver onto the cloth, payment that was plenty, but that became less with every visit. “I must make ready for my son.”

  ***

  The sun was setting over Stoddard’s walls when the herald announced the approaching army of men. The blazon of the Blue Falcon brought the bridge crashing down and opened the gates wide to the returning knight. The sight of Sir Conan as he rode with his falcon on his shoulder still awed the people here, and the serfs and children came running to stare with wide eyes at this warrior leading many men of battle into the small keep.

  “Boy,” Conan called to one of the bystanders, “have the fires stoked and meat brought forth to feed my men. The night is cold and they would eat in comfort. By my order, lad.”

  Edwina was sitting before the hearth waiting for his arrival and jumped to her feet when he entered. “Welcome home, my lord,” she said.

  Conan smiled at her, but it did not mirror his feelings as he looked at her. He fought to keep his pain from showing on his face. He wanted to look at Edwina and be overcome with love; but as he looked at her he felt so little.